A new home

We reluctantly left the splendor of Granada to go and get settled in Sevilla about a week before our CELTA course started. The first week in Sevilla wasn't very pleasant. We were both sick and the lead we thought we had for a home fell through. So. we were scrambling to find a place to live and ended up paying a hefty fee to an agent to hook us up. The lsat couple of nights before moving in we were able to stay with some lovely CouchSurfers, Paula and Victor, who have become friends of ours and gave us our first little tour of Seville. The room we rented worked out just fine, only a short walk to school and on a side streeet connecting to the famous Calle Sierpes (shopping shopping shopping) in the very center of the Center district. Our flatmate was a cameraman of some sort and his work took him away from Sevilla for weeks at a time, so we had the place to ourselves for most of our late night lesson preparations. It was kind of a weird place, though--noisy through the night with trash collectors, streetwashers, singing drunks, and the cafe downstairs; incredibly cold and drafty because of huge gaps in doors and windows, plus a big circular hole cut out of the glass in the kitchen window; and teeming with mosquitos (in November!) until we bought a plug-in mosquito killer. During the time of course, we really didn't have much time for seeing the city. We'd go out with classmates on the weekends, and over the one four day holiday weekend another CouchSurfer took us to a flamenco bar and to the annual gathering of the "Tuna" for the day of the virgin. The Tuna are like an ancient fraternity who wear traditional costumes and play traditional music in exchange for drinks at bars. For the day of the virgin, all of the Tuna groups come to a plaza beside the cathedral in Seville and play all through the night to the statue of the virgin. It was quite the spectacle--unfortunately we forgot to bring our camera.